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Topic Review (Newest First)

10-11-2012 11:33 PM

ClassicDriver

What about ABS's system?

What about the system from ABS Power Brake Inc?... Is this stuff considered bad?

This is the Electric brake booster, it is an obsolete Jeep electric brake that was made by Bendix, they are out of production, there are only cores available, and those cores are polished up and sold as new. Even the 'new' master cylinder castings have the internal parts from the used cores.

Cores are taken off a car because they have previously failed, or the car has been scrapped because it was worn out, 'Cores' are often rebuilt with new parts and sold as 'rebuilt'. This unit is obsolete and there are no new parts, only old parts from other cores - 'Used' not 'Rebuilt'. The electric motor, accumulator, and pressure switch are constantly failing on all vehicles with electric type brake boosters, and the owners of vehicles with them have to source and replace one of the three parts about once a year - so they are looking for ways to get rid of it and convert to something else. You are being charge $1,100 for a junkyard product.

01-08-2012 08:17 AM

LATECH

The electric booster has been used on 88 t birds that were turbo, GM had them for a few years as another person posted, and yes , they were very unreliable.
Ford has used them as a safety backup brake booster for the f 600 (and up) since back in the day.It had hydro boost w a electro boost piggybacked to it.pretty cool.
The turbo t bird ones were pretty reliable actually and were implemented with the ABS which you can simply not use if desired.
I would pesonally go for the hydro boost setup. They are very reliable .As they are pretty common, parts are readily available too.
It pays to shop around . someone has to be making these with chrome and better outwardly apearance for us hot rod guys.

01-08-2012 01:16 AM

396375

The Powermasters are still available.Kirban Performance stocks them.They are rebuilds from Cardone and do carry a lifetime guarantee.A lot of the rebuild parts have been improved over the years.The accumulator bowl and pressure switch are much better.The core charge was $75 last time I looked.If you get a good one they work well.The only problem is finding a good one.It's hit or miss.Hydro Boost is the way to go.

12-08-2011 09:44 PM

mattpowerbrake

Powermaster

12-08-2011 09:43 PM

mattpowerbrake

I didn't get those youtube embeds right:

12-08-2011 09:06 PM

mattpowerbrake

Electric Brake Answers

As many of you seem to have figured out, the Electric Brake was from a Jeep, there were a few other different inceptions of 'electric brakes', as in the Turbo Buick Powermaster, and the electric brake unit on the Ford T-bird SuperCoupes. You can see videos here where we covered both of those

Both of these units were used to try and work around the complete lack of vacuum that the two cars had because of the supercharging they came with.

No vacuum + vacuum booster = fast car with no brakes. So Bob at Power Brake Service developed what is now being called the Electric Brake in the mid to late 80's, because it seemed to solve the lack of vacuum problems that the muscle cars and hot rods we normally see have, because of their blowers and huge cams.

The advantage of being in business for 60 years is that your customers update you on how products worked out, and you can adapt to improve. After a while our customers were telling us that the electric motors would burn out faster than they would expect and the units would fail... after a while. Bendix stopped making the new units, and there was nobody making parts to rebuild it. No new units and no parts meant that it wasn't a viable option. The pressure switches, accumulators, and pumps were all prone to failure, and three sources of failure is not something that we would want to sell.

These days, with no major manufacturer making new units, and nobody making rebuild kits, means that there are no new units available to anybody anywhere, and there are absolutely no rebuilt units anywhere for anybody to adapt to their other application. They are also not making Powermaster parts (go ahead and find out how the Grand National guys feel about that), and ATE doesn't care to make the T-bird units again.

That means that there are no legitimate electric booster units coming from PBS (us) SSBC, Baer or anybody. There are only un-rebuilt used units available. There are new casting that are being made, but there are only used internal parts place in them (the casting doesnít stop the car, the parts do). We've thought about selling them again since they seem popular, but we don't know where to start since whatever cores are available have been over rebuilt and machined. It is a cold hard fact for the few of us performance brake companiesÖ and the electric vacuum pumps are fighting a loosing battle against the complete lack of vacuum in a performance engine. The New Delco Moraine 11 inch boosters that you can buy, arenít being made by Delco, they are stamped under license in China, making them un-American for your American classic. For the last twenty years the big companies have been using crimped cans, not twist off, for vacuum boosters, so they can only be rebuilt twice before the out can is trash. Finally, the 7 inch vacuum boosters that people are putting on only put out between 400-600 psi, and calipers require 1200 to operate, so they are dangerous. Hydroboosts are the perfect solution, but are on the expensive side for a lot of people. Pretty frustrating, isnít it?

12-08-2011 06:38 PM

mattpowerbrake

Can't stress enough to rebuild

Quote:

Originally Posted by ogre

i realize this thread was started in 05, but i thought i would put
my info in for future readers.

i found a hydroboost out of an 03 mustang gt, junkyard purchased for $100.
fabbed the bracket and made a plate to weld in my frame that the bracket would bolt to.
i used my stock swing arm and pedal.

my truck has power steering anyway, picture above is before plumbing the hydro lines.
i did not move the pivot points of the original swing arm. but i was able to cut 3" out of the pedal height,
thus lowering the pedal to the floor (remember those weak *** legs). this helped considerably.

i have only driven my truck 20 miles before putting it in the shop for the winter (and to finish the bed).
but i can tell you that they work rather well.

I can't stress enough to rebuild brake units that come from the junkyard, units are available but, their quality: depends on the mileage, and depends on how the previous drive drove the car. The Hydroboost is the one thing really what we are going all the way with for everything, but, the rubber can be swollen, and it is just so easy to get a rebuild. It is the best things since sliced bread but they should be rebuilt every 100,000 to 150,000 miles.

Be sure of the reputation of the rebuilder, because there are more than a few companies that we are aware of these days that repaint or polish up the outside of a an old unit and sell it as rebuilt (trust me on that). If you wonder why a seller has them for a fraction of what the other sellers have them for, then they are scamming you, and that goes for most things.

12-02-2009 05:57 PM

ogre

hydroboost

i realize this thread was started in 05, but i thought i would put
my info in for future readers.

i found a hydroboost out of an 03 mustang gt, junkyard purchased for $100.
fabbed the bracket and made a plate to weld in my frame that the bracket would bolt to.
i used my stock swing arm and pedal.

my truck has power steering anyway, picture above is before plumbing the hydro lines.
i did not move the pivot points of the original swing arm. but i was able to cut 3" out of the pedal height,
thus lowering the pedal to the floor (remember those weak *** legs). this helped considerably.

i have only driven my truck 20 miles before putting it in the shop for the winter (and to finish the bed).
but i can tell you that they work rather well.

09-25-2009 04:08 PM

grifzila

Electric Boost

Yes there is electric boost. It was used where there was cramped space under the hood in the normal area of the master cylinder. I first saw it on a Jeep Cherokee.

This is not something you would want to adapt into a project. Hydroboost itself is a fabulous mature design when it uses a power steering pump to supply the > 1000 psi fluid pressure as the boost power source. The problem with the electric driven pump power source is that the pump design is below poor.

They chose to use a very cheap electric brush motor that is below the quality of say a electric window motor. They were not careful with fluid connector choices, pump body was aluminum, etc. The pump would strain to reach the design pressure.

How it was supposed to work: The pump would come on and pump fluid until a pressure switch was satisfied at 1200 psi. The pump motor would shut off until the pressure dropped back down (the brakes were pressed). So far things are ok until: Something leaks, the cheap pressure switch contacts stick or don't make, fluid runs low and the system stays on until the motor smokes or the pump gets hot enough to melt the "o" ring seals. The units are more expensive than power steering systems because they are constantly failing so the supply of rebuilds runs low and the supply of "cores" run low - driving the core charge through the roof.

I had considered using the brake fluid pump from an ABS system as a power source because they are good quality but, decided not to chance using a motor /pump that was supposed to come on a few times a year for continuous use. Stopping is just too important.

Hydroboost - Yes *** electric boost no!

John

06-24-2009 04:22 PM

Tallon

Building Your own brake system

Hi Mike
A hydro boost can be mounted in any position frame rails included.
A remote master cylinder is no problem but you should use a 1.125 dia piston power brake master.
The pedal feel is very light a touch of your foot on the brake pedal will stop most rods out there in normal driving.Its just like a Ford super duty with a diesel motor. As far as distance goes it would depend on what other baking components you have installed. A mid 80s corvette 6 piston caliper large rotor will stop like a super car with a hydro boost. I dont want to get in trouble with this site but you contacted me so www.tallonhydraulics.com
will help you find what you need and can build what you want just contact them through the web site.

06-24-2009 11:15 AM

Hot Rod Mike

More info

Quote:

Originally Posted by DYNO MIKE

Joe
There is such a thing and believe me it is great I'm running a 454 with a pretty aggressive cam and so the vacuum was not as much as required to run vacuum assist brakes
At the SEMA show was a new product that filled the bill it's a electric assist power brake that is firewall mount, under the dash mount or frame rail
in my case an added bonus was it gave me a ton of clearance to be able to remove BBC valve covers and not fight the boost chamber
Go to ABSPOWERBRAKE.COM and read all about it

Dyno Mike,

Hey, can you elaborate more on this ? I am interested since I will be putting a 496 BBC in my hot rod & will run a fairly aggressive cam like you stated. Do you have any comments regarding before & after stopping distances ? How about pedal feel ? Do you see any concerns w/a frame rail setup w/a remote fill can which is what I would need for my install ? Any other thoughts would be appreciated

Thanks,
Mike

04-20-2009 01:03 PM

joe_padavano

Quote:

Originally Posted by jrfishel1

FYI, my 1990 Cadillac Fleetwood has an electric brake booster as factory equipment. The v-8 FWD version carries the electric booster due to limited clearance. This is a cheap way of getting power brakes for a large car (my fleetwood is quite heavy) that cannot use vacuum assist braking.

That's the Powermaster system that was discussed earlier in this thread. Again, it is an electric pump that uses brake fluid to also provide hydraulic boost to the brakes. Similar in concept to the hydroboost that uses the power steering pump, but it's totally self-contained. The Powermaster system was used on a lot of GM full size cars in the 1980s and early 90s, including the Buick turbo cars. Frequently the accumulator goes bad, but it is also an easy fix.

04-19-2009 07:46 PM

jrfishel1

Electric power brake booster

FYI, my 1990 Cadillac Fleetwood has an electric brake booster as factory equipment. The v-8 FWD version carries the electric booster due to limited clearance. This is a cheap way of getting power brakes for a large car (my fleetwood is quite heavy) that cannot use vacuum assist braking.

04-11-2009 06:46 PM

Tallon

hydro boosters

I was just reading the posts on hydro boosters. I was suprised at the lack of solid info. Just a few quick points junk yard boosters are prone to leak you dont know the history in most cases. You can buy a warranty booster from many sources you want a one year warranty. Look for a rebuilder that tests each booster.Rebuilders that dont test dont warranty there work. Many companies are now building mounting plates for many applications direct bolt in. To bleed a hydro booster of air you need to use ahigh quality power steering fuid not ATF. Your booster install instructions will run you through the bleeding process. And do use a filter on your boosters it will save the life of the booster.

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